Corporate purpose: In August 2019, The Business Roundtable issued a statement signed by 181 CEOs who pledged to “lead their companies for the benefit of all stakeholders—customers, employees, suppliers, communities and shareholders.” As You Sow and Harrington Investments have filed resolution asking what this means, in practice, at six companies.

The proposal asks that the boards of Bank of America, Citigroup and Goldman Sachs, “acting as responsible fiduciaries, review the Statement of the Purpose of a Corporation to determine if such statement is reflected in our Company’s current governance documents, policies, long term plans, goals, metrics and sustainability practices and publish its recommendations on how any incongruities may be reconciled by changes to our Company’s governance documents, policies or practices.”
At BlackRock and McKesson, the proposal seeks “a report based on a review of the BRT Statement of the Purpose of a Corporation signed by our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer and provide the board’s perspective regarding how our Company’s governance and management systems should be altered to fully implement the Statement of Purpose.”

At JPMorgan Chase, the request is to “provide oversight and guidance as to how the new statement of stakeholder theory should alter our Company’s governance and management system, and publish recommendations regarding implementation.”
SEC action—All of the recipients save McKesson have challenged the resolution at the SEC, arguing variously that it is too vague, relates to ordinary business and is moot. So far, the SEC has agreed with the ordinary business argument at JPMorgan Chase. Challenges from Bank of America, BlackRock and Goldman Sachs are still pending.

Sustainable products portal: Individual investor Stephen Sacks says Amazon.com “shall in their sales website have a department category concerning sustainability products particularly to address climate change. They shall populate it from their other listings.” Amazon is contending at the SEC that this concerns ordinary business, and the challenge seems likely to succeed.